When to go grocery shopping — a whole event: a tour of an American supermarket

A user of the Pikabu portal under the nickname Diaver has been living in the USA for several years. From time to time, he talks about life on the other side of the ocean. What are the roads, city blocks, resorts, taxes, and so on. Now it's time to describe a typical American supermarket.

The United States is a country with a very low population density. As such, there are no shops within walking distance, so going to the store is always an event. It is necessary to allocate time, make a shopping list and go by car to the nearest or not so supermarket.

In the United States, the Costco chain of stores, an analogue of the Russian Metro, is very popular, where you can often buy food, clothing and other goods much cheaper than in conventional retail stores. When I lived in Wisconsin, the nearest store was located 10 minutes from home, but there is no such chain of stores in Rhode Island, and we have to travel to neighboring Massachusetts.

To go shopping at Costco, you need to pay for an annual subscription worth $ 55. At the entrance, the aunt checks the presence of the buyer's card.

A shopping cart with straps for strapping children.

Immediately at the entrance there is a department with alcohol. On average, a bottle of wine costs 10-15 dollars, a box of beer — 25-30. An interesting feature: the price tags do not write what kind of wine it is, sweet or dry. Sellers often can't tell you. Every time you have to choose at random.

Beer in the States does not buy bottles, just boxes. It's the same story with soda.

TVs cost from $ 200 and up to 2500. Six months ago, I bought a 55-inch 4K TV in this store for $ 550. Now it costs about 500.

A lot of various clothes at a price from 10 to 30 dollars.

In this store, we mainly take meat and fruits with vegetables, since they are of fairly good quality and inexpensive. Prices are per pound (0.453 kg).

5 pounds of tangerines cost $ 5.

Kiwi — $ 7 for 2 pounds, mango - $ 1 per pound.

Semi-finished products that Americans actively eat. All sorts of snacks like cookies, nuts and other things are sold immediately in boxes.

You can't find a liter bottle of milk or juice. Here everything is sold in cans of a gallon (3.7 liters). Milk costs $ 2.6 per gallon.

This kind of food cart cost 390 bucks. A human cub is not included in this price.

By the way, the tax is usually not included in the price and is paid separately. It is different in each state. On average, this tax is about 5%. And in some states, food is not taxed by them. There are several reasons why the tax is paid separately, one of them is that the store disclaims responsibility for price increases due to the tax.

In the store, food is not packed in bags, but you can take cardboard boxes and put everything in them. As practice has shown, cardboard boxes are much more convenient than packages.

There is a toilet in the store. And it's pretty clean.

A drinking fountain near the toilet. Such fountains are very common in the States. They can be found in almost any large store. In the United States, there is no concept of an official language, but by default, English is considered the main language, although often the inscriptions are duplicated in Spanish, as here.

In the USA, there have never been problems with small kitchens, so all household kitchen appliances are very impressive in size.

Here you can also have a snack with a cheap hot dog. Along with the hot dog, they give out a glass for soda. You pour soda yourself in unlimited quantities.

A fairly roomy trunk is almost completely clogged.